


he was better than me

by Ehlihr (Elihaha)



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Multi, Timelines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 20:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5469515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elihaha/pseuds/Ehlihr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nico di Angelo has a complicated life with complicated relationships.</p>
            </blockquote>





	he was better than me

Nico is fifteen when he realizes he might like will a little too much.

He suppresses the feeling, a deep churn in his stomach.

Will smiles a little funny at him when they’re alone, and Nico can’t help but feel hopeful.

“Stop that,” he tells himself. He won’t repeat his past mistakes.

…

Nico is seventeen when he gets his first fake I.D with the help of Lou Ellen.

He tastes alcohol and likes that the part of him that’s neurotic seems to sleep.

He wakes up in a strange place and leaves before sunrise.

He feels sick.

...

Nico is nineteen when he finally gets used to strangers.

He stops telling them his name.

He gets used to pulling them from bars.

Soon, he gets itchy when he doesn’t.

…

Bianca has been dead for ten years, but he just does what he usually does - read comics from when he was much, much younger- the ones she liked- and think about what it would be like to have her around.

He’s not alright, but when Hazel calls to check on him, he decides he's better than he used to be.

…

He is twenty-one when he has his first legal drink, and goes overboard.

Will sits with him in the morning, scowling.

“Why are you staring at me like that?”

“I’m mad at you for drinking so much, but…”

“What?”

“It’s the first time I’ve seen you hungover at our house in ages.”

…

Nico is twenty-two when Reyna dies.

She didn’t do what he did, but she still drank.

She still knew what it was like to be Nico, in a way.

He spends his first two weeks in bed, alone, for the first time in years.

…

He is twenty-four when he kisses Will, shaking.

It’s not like a stranger- this time, there’s something to ruin.

Will moans and he feels more relaxed than he expected he could be.

…

He’s twenty-five when they break up.

Except they didn’t break up.

Will gets a residency and spends no time with Nico, and Nico just can’t do commitment.

They decide that they can see other people when they got lonely.

Nico is the only one that does.

…

Nico is twenty-seven when they break up, and he’s not as sad as he thought he would be.

He knew that their relationship had been over a long time, and they’re still friends.

He doesn’t see why Will looks so upset but doesn’t ask.

Will tells him he misses him, and Nico crumbles. He wasn’t as okay as he thought he was.

They’re still friends, but they call each other when they’re lonely now.

It’s only a matter of time- Nico knows how these sorts of things go.

…

They get their shit together when he’s twenty-eight.

His friends look relieved - like they knew.

…

They’re married when Nico turns thirty-two.

It’s a summer wedding, because of Will, and it’s in Venice because Nico’s romantic.

It’s a small, charming event, and for once, Nico is very, very happy.

…

Nico is thirty-three when they argue about kids.

To Nico, kids were vital. To Will, they were optional. They don’t talk for a week.

Will mumbles, “I just don’t like babies. Older kids are alright,” and Nico grins.

Will may have admitted defeat, but it’s sort of worth it, he guesses

…

Nico is thirty-four when they adopt a nine-year-old girl named Rosa.

Nico spoils her, and Will begrudgingly does the same (though he’s stricter on school work).

Life is mellow and sweet, much like Rosa, who looked alarmingly familiar to a fighter he had known many years ago.

She wears her hair in a braid for the first time and Nico realizes.

…

Nico is thirty-eight when Will is mugged, shot, and killed.

He goes numb, closes the door on the officer without a word.

He hides again, unfamiliar with loss after so many years.

Rosa drags him out of bed on the day of the funeral, and he can barely walk.

His eulogy is short.

“He was so much better than me.”

…

He’s thirty-nine when he takes a week off to stay with Hazel and Frank.

They keep giving him pitying looks, and he snaps.

Guilt swarms him, and he doesn’t know if its the beer or the overwhelming emotion or both, but he cries for the first time in years.

...

When Nico is forty-two, Rosa leaves for college, and he has a legitimate midlife crisis.

He spends every evening in the bar by his apartment and wakes up hungover for a month.

It’s how he met Dom, who doesn’t drink and speaks really softly.

They have coffee every week and it’s a moment of solitude.

He has a son about the same age as Rosa and they lament about their going off to college and past relationships.

Nico feels forty-two, but he’s surprised to be happy about it.

…

Nico is forty-eight. It’s been ten years.

…

Nico is forty-nine when he remarries (he didn’t propose this time around).

The wedding is huge- Dom has a classically large Italian family.

For a moment, Nico considers how large his mortal family must technically be, and doesn’t know how he should feel.

When he looks at the absurd amount of cousins that swarm Dom, he settles on warm.

…

Nico is fifty-six when Rosa has her first kid.

He’s about ninety percent sure the baby hates him, but when she giggles and grabs at Nico’s face, he grins like a child.

He babysits frequently after that.

…

He’s fifty-nine when Hazel dies, and he realizes that this was just a trend in his life.

He should know to get used to it, but he can’t help but feel like the earth crumbles around him.

Dom asks how it happened, months later, but Nico hasn’t told him about his father’s side of the family beyond, “he was absent”.

Nico just shakes his head.

…

At sixty-five, Nico retires from forensics and decides to open a coffee shop like the true Italian he was.

He was shit at making coffee since baking was the only thing he was good at.

He hires the woman who makes Colombian coffee and yelled at him for “insulting coffee’s name”.

He never admits that he likes the taste better than Italian coffee, and the single mother of two never admits to liking his baking.

It’s a truce, of sorts.

…

He’s seventy-three when Dom died at seventy-eight.

That’s average, he tells himself, but he doesn't feel better about it.

He doesn’t mope, this time, but has Layla handle the counter at the shop for a while.

…

Nico is ninety-three when a blonde man walks into the shop, and he looks familiar.

He orders a coffee with two sugars and two creams, calling it a ‘double double’ with a familiar Canadian accent he had heard Frank speak in plenty of times.

Nico nearly drops the cup.

Nico asks for his name for the cup, and he says “Mike,” with a polite smile.

…

'Michael’ stops by frequently, says he really likes their coffee, and Layla smirks.

Nico sighs and tries not to feel too excited.

…

After three months, Nico passes away quietly in his sleep.

Michael doesn't know why he’s so upset. The man was old and probably lived a very fulfilling life. He’d only spoken to him a handful of times, anyway.

He goes to the cafe every day because it’s his routine.

…

He ends up speaking to a nice woman named Haley pretty often, and learns a lot more about her grandfather.

He sounds like he was a good man.

Like Nico was much better than he was.

…

One day, he says, “I feel like I met your grandfather a lot longer than five months ago.”

Haley hesitates.

“Maybe you did.”

**Author's Note:**

> thanks @mansi for listening to me gush abt this and telling me to write it ily


End file.
